Polish writer Tadeusz Konwicki dies at 88

Jan. 08, 2015

WARSAW, Poland (AP) — Tadeusz Konwicki, a prominent Polish writer and filmmaker whose works during the communist era lampooned the authoritarian Soviet-imposed system, has died. He was 88.

Konwicki is best known for his novels "A Minor Apocalypse," a satire of life in a totalitarian state, and "The Polish Complex," a polemic on a national historical condition tragically defined by military defeats and foreign occupation. Both were published in the 1970s by the country's underground press, bypassing the state censors.

Polish media reported that he died on Wednesday evening in his Warsaw apartment.

Konwicki was born in 1926 and spent his childhood in a part of Poland now belonging to Lithuania. During World War II he fought in the country's underground army against the Nazis. He initially supported communism before turning against it.